The Number of Fatalities Drives Disaster Aid: Increasing Sensitivity to People in Need

I. Evangelidis, Bram Van den Bergh

Research output: Indexed journal article Articlepeer-review

33 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In the studies reported here, an analysis of financial donations in response to natural disasters showed that the amount of money allocated for humanitarian aid depends on the number of fatalities but not on the number of survivors who are affected by the disaster (i.e., the actual beneficiaries of the aid). On the basis of the experimental evidence, we discuss the underlying cause and provide guidelines to increase sensitivity to people in need.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2226-2234
Number of pages9
JournalPsychological Science
Volume24
Issue number11
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Nov 2013
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • decision making
  • disaster donation
  • heuristics
  • policy making
  • prosocial behavior
  • reliability
  • validity

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